There s been saturation coverage of Google electrifying decision last week to defy the Chinese government and stop censoring its Chinese web search engine. Google s stock faltered briefly on the news while Baidu, its main Chinese rival, shot up 14% in one day to a new high. But I haven t seen any answers to a simple question: Which search engine is better: Baidu or Google.cn?

The answer is important to Google, to the Chinese and U.S. governments, and to investors. International competitiveness will likely turn on education, information and technology as it has in the past. The nation that can offer its population the best Internet access and search technology will enjoy a huge advantage. The company that offers that technology will reap enormous profits. If Google is that company, China can t prohibit it from doing business in China without inflicting immeasurable harm on its own citizens. If it s Baidu, and Baidu can maintain its advantage, then perhaps China risks little in shutting down its main rival and investors should rush to buy Baidu stock.

So I decided to conduct my own test by trying several searches on Baidu and Google.cn. You didn t know I was so adept in the Chinese language? It s true I don t speak or read Mandarin, which is China s official tongue that's spoken as the first language by an estimated 850 million people. But fortunately I know someone who does, a Chinese citizen who also speaks English. I won t name or otherwise identify her out of concern that even this exercise might be deemed subversive by the Chinese authorities. Here are the searches and results:

Tibet. On Baidu, the first listing was Baidu Baike, a Chinese equivalent of Wikipedia. It contained a highly sanitized article with nothing likely to offend the authorities in Beijing. A travel web site appeared too, but when my friend clicked on the site, a message appeared: It is not the time for visiting. Whether that referred to the winter weather or politics is anybody s guess. On Google, Baidu Baike was also the first entry. There were also several recent news entries about Tibet, including items on investment in Tibet by a Chinese company and how China s policies were aiding poor Tibetan students. With the addition of two Chinese characters to indicate travel, more travel sites appeared on both search engines that included selected itineraries as well as prices for various packages.

Earthquake in Haiti. The first result on Baidu was from the Shanghai Stock Information Service Corp., the equivalent of a wire service. The item extolled the humanitarian aid China was offering and cited the compassionate nature of the Chinese people. On Google.cn, the first item was from ChinaNews.com. It was a story about Chinese people who died in Haiti. The second listing was from News.cn and discussed British aid efforts.

Chanel No. 5. Baidu s first entry was from Baidu Baike, an article about the iconic French perfume. The second was a fashion web site, which included comments and discussion groups as well as a purchase link. Google s results produced a photo of the perfume as well as numerous online shopping sites offering Chanel No. 5 but no discussion groups.

At this juncture I realized that in comparing Baidu to Google.cn I may have been missing a broader point. In many ways, the Google.cn results were better. It typically yielded a wider range of entries including news. No wonder Baidu is said to be so popular with the Chinese authorities when the first entry for Haiti was unabashed propaganda and a search for Tibet yielded no news that could be considered even remotely subversive. Still, Google.cn wasn t that much better, and my Chinese friend said many of her friends in China prefer Baidu.

What really struck me was the limited nature of the results on both Baidu and Google.cn. Out of curiosity, I ran the same searches on the standard English-language Google and got an avalanche of useful results. For Tibet, one of the top-ranked results was Tibet.net, which is the official site of the Tibetan government in exile. That didn t show up on either Baidu or Google.cn.

But let s put politics aside; we know it s a sensitive subject in China. Focusing only on commerce, English-language Google had many more opportunities for shopping and travel for spending money than did either of the Chinese sites. No wonder that, according to my Chinese friend, she rarely uses either Chinese search engine preferring the English-language Google. Of course, she has the advantage of speaking English.

This informal comparison suggests that the Chinese-language search engines lag Google in the U.S. This strikes me as a significant competitive disadvantage for China and for its citizens who have no choice but to search in a Chinese language. From a policy standpoint, the worst move China could make would be to force Baidu s main competitor out of the country leaving Baidu with less incentive to spend on research and development and improve its results.

As I ve written before, effective search is partly a function of search volume, the billions of requests that help a site understand what people want to know when they type words like Tibet or Chanel No.5. This is the key to Google s dominance in the U.S. The Chinese search engines are still relatively young, and my results suggest this process is still in its infancy. The task is undoubtedly complicated by the fact that China has multiple languages in addition to Mandarin, some of them mutually unintelligible. Over one billion people, a fifth of the world s population, speak some form of Chinese (a fact I learned from English-language Google). As far as I can tell, this vast Chinese market is still up for grabs.

As an investor and a Google shareholder, this gives me confidence that Google s decision entails relatively limited risk. (I ve recommended Google shares on numerous occasions including this past year.) Conversely, I believe the recent run-up in Baidu stock is shortsighted. Baidu will never dominate the Chinese market over the long run unless it improves its search technology. It s also been subject to recent management turmoil for reasons that haven t been fully explained. I don t own Baidu, but if I did, I d consider taking profits at this juncture.

I hope China finds a face-saving way to end this standoff. I believe it s clearly in the best interest of the Chinese government and its people as well as investors that it keep Google and search-engine competition in China.